Best Served Cold

by Джо Аберкромби

  “You sure Orso’s inside?” she called to Victus.

  “Oh, we’re sure. Cosca spoke to him, first day.”

  Monza didn’t draw much comfort from that idea. When Cosca started talking to an enemy he usually ended up richer and on the other side. “What did those two bastards have to say to each other?”

  “Ask Cosca.”

  “I will.”

  “We’ve got the place surrounded, don’t worry about that. Trenches on three sides.” Victus slapped the earth beside them. “If you can trust a mercenary to do one thing, it’s dig himself a damn good hole to hide in. Then there’s pickets down in the woods at the bottom of the cliff.” The woods where Monza had slid to a halt in the rubbish, broken to pulp, groaning like the dead in hell. “And a wide selection of Styria’s finest soldiery further out. Osprians, Sipanese, Affoians, in numbers. All set on seeing our old employer dead. There ain’t a rat getting out without our say-so. But then if Orso wanted to run, he could’ve run weeks ago. He didn’t. You know him better than anyone, don’t you? You reckon he’ll try and run now?”

  “No,” she had to admit. He’d sooner die, which suited her fine. “How about us getting in?”

  “Whoever designed the bastard place knew what they were doing. Ground around the inner ward’s way too steep to try anything.”

  “I could’ve told you that. North side of the outer ward’s your best chance at an assault, then try the inner wall from there.”

  “Our very thoughts, but there’s a gulf between thinking and doing, specially when high walls are part of the case. No luck yet.” Victus clambered up on a box and beckoned to her. Between two wicker screens, beyond a row of sharpened stakes pointing up the broken slope, she could see the nearest corner of the fortress. One of the towers was on fire, its tall roof fallen in leaving only a cone of naked beams wreathed in flames, notches of battlements picked out in red and yellow, black smoke belching into the dark blue sky. “We set that tower to burning,” he pointed proudly towards it, “with a catapult.”

  “Beautiful. We can all go home.”

  “Something, ain’t it?” He led them through a long dugout smelling of damp and sour sweat, men snoring on pallets down both sides. “ ‘Wars are won not by one great action,’ ” intoning the words like a bad actor, “ ‘but many small chances.’ Weren’t you always telling us that? Who was it? Stalicus?”

  “Stolicus, you dunce.”

  “Some dead bastard. Anyway, Cosca’s got a plan, but I’ll let him tell you himself. You know how the old man loves to put on a show.” Victus stopped at a hollow in the rock where four trenches came together, sheltered by a roof of gently flapping canvas and lit by a single rustling torch. “The captain general said he’d be along. Feel free to make use of the facilities while you wait.” Facilities which amounted to dirt. “Unless there’s anything else, your Excellency?”

  “Just one more thing.” He flinched in surprise as her spit spattered softly across his eye. “That’s from Benna, you treacherous little fuck.”

  Victus wiped his face, eyes creeping shiftily to Shivers, then back to her. “I didn’t do nothing you wouldn’t have done. Nothing your brother wouldn’t have done, that’s certain. Nothing you didn’t both do to Cosca, and you owed him more than I owed you-”

  “That’s why you’re wiping your face instead of trying to hold your guts in.”

  “You ever think you might have brought this on yourself? Big ambitions mean big risks. All I’ve done is float with the current-”

  Shivers took a sudden step forwards. “Off you float, then, ’fore you get your throat cut.” Monza realised he had a knife out in one big fist. The one she’d given him the first day they met.

  “Whoah there, big man.” Victus held up his palms, rings glittering. “I’m on my way, don’t worry.” He made a big show of turning and strutting off into the night. “You two need to work on your tempers,” wagging one finger over his shoulder. “No point getting riled up over every little thing. That’ll only end in blood, believe me!”

  It wasn’t so hard for Monza to believe. Everything ended in blood, whatever she did. She realised she was left alone with Shivers, something she’d spent the last few weeks avoiding like the rot. She knew she should say something, take some sort of step towards making things square with him. They had their problems, but at least he was her man, rather than Rogont’s. She might have need of someone to save her life in the coming days, and he was no monster, however he might look.

  “Shivers.” He turned to her, knife still clutched tight, steel blade and steel eye catching the torch flame and twinkling the colours of fire. “Listen-”

  “No, you listen.” He bared his teeth, taking a step towards her.

  “Monza! You came!” Cosca emerged from one of the trenches, arms spread wide. “And with my favourite Northman!” He ignored the knife and shook Shivers warmly by his free hand, then grabbed Monza’s shoulders and kissed her on both cheeks. “I haven’t had a chance to congratulate you on your speech. Born on a farm. A nice touch. Humble. And talk of peace. From you? It was like seeing a farmer express his hopes for famine. Even this old cynic couldn’t help but be moved.”

  “Fuck yourself, old man.” But she was secretly glad she didn’t have to find the hard words now.

  Cosca raised his brows. “You try and say the right thing-”

  “Some folk don’t like the right thing,” said Shivers in his gravelly whisper, sliding his knife away. “You ain’t learned that yet?”

  “Every day alive is a lesson. This way, comrades! Just up ahead we can get a fine view of the assault.”

  “You’re attacking? Now?”

  “We tried in daylight. Didn’t work.” It didn’t look like darkness was working any better. There were wounded men lining the next trench-grimaces, groans, bloody bandages. “Wherever is my noble employer, his Excellency Duke Rogont?”

  “In Talins.” And Monza spat into the dirt. There was plenty of it for the purpose. “Preparing for his coronation.”

  “So soon? He is aware Orso’s still alive, I suppose, and by all indications will be for some time yet? Isn’t there a saying about selling the lion’s skin before he’s killed?”

  “I’ve mentioned it. Many times.”

  “I can only imagine. The Serpent of Talins, counselling caution to the Duke of Delay. Sweet irony!”

  “Some good it’s done. He’s got every carpenter, clothier and jeweller in the city busy at the Senate House, making it ready for the ceremony.”

  “Sure the bloody place won’t fall in on him?”

  “We can hope,” muttered Shivers.

  “It will bring to mind proud shadows of Styria’s Imperial past, apparently,” said Monza.

  Cosca snorted. “That or the shameful collapse of Styria’s last effort at unity.”

  “I’ve mentioned that too. Many times.”

  “Ignored?”

  “Getting used to it.”

  “Ah, hubris! As a long-time sufferer myself I quickly recognise the symptoms.”

  “You’ll like this one, then.” Monza couldn’t stop herself sneering. “He’s importing a thousand white songbirds from distant Thond.”

  “Only a thousand?”

  “Symbol of peace, apparently. They’ll be released over the crowd when he rises to greet them as King of Styria. And admirers from all across the Circle of the World-counts, dukes, princes and the God of the fucking Gurkish too for all I know-will applaud his gigantic opinion of himself, and fall over themselves to lick his fat arse.”

  Cosca raised his brows. “Do I detect a souring of relations between Talins and Ospria?”

  “There’s something about crowns that makes men act like fools.”

  “One takes it you’ve mentioned that too?”

  “Until my throat’s sore, but surprisingly enough, he doesn’t want to hear it.”

  “Sounds quite the event. Shame I won’t be there.”

  Monza frowned. “You won’t?”


  “Me? No, no, no. I’d only lower the tone. There are concerns about some shady deal done for the Dukedom of Visserine, would you believe.”

  “Never.”

  “Who knows how these far-fetched rumours get started? Besides, someone needs to keep Duke Orso company.”

  She worked her tongue sourly round her mouth and spat again. “I hear the two of you have been chatting already.”

  “No more than small talk. Weather, wine, women, his impending destruction, you know the sort of thing. He said he would have my head. I replied I quite understood his enthusiasm, as I find it hugely useful myself. I was firm yet amusing throughout, in fact, while he was, in all honesty, somewhat peevish.” Cosca waved one long finger around. “The siege, possibly, has him out of sorts.”

  “Nothing about you changing sides, then?”

  “Perhaps that would have been his next topic, but we were somewhat interrupted by some flatbow fire and an abortive assault upon the walls. Perhaps it will come up when we next take tea together?”

  The trench opened into a dugout mostly covered with a plank ceiling, almost too low to stand under. Ladders leaned against the right-hand wall, ready for men to climb and join the attack. A good three score of armed and armoured mercenaries knelt ready to do just that. Cosca went bent over between their ranks, slapping backs.

  “Glory, boys, glory, and a decent pay-off!”

  Their frowns turned to grins, they tapped their weapons against their shields, their helmets, their breastplates, sending up an approving rattle.

  “General!”

  “The captain general!”

  “Cosca!”

  “Boys, boys!” He chuckled, thumping arms, shaking hands, giving out lazy salutes. All as far from her style of command as could’ve been. She’d had to stay cold, hard, untouchable, or there would have been no respect. A woman can’t afford the luxury of being friendly with the men. So she’d let Benna do the laughing for her. Probably why the laughter had been thin on the ground since Orso killed him.

  “And up here is my little home from home.” Cosca led them up a ladder and into a kind of shed built from heavy logs, lit by a pair of flickering lamps. There was a wide opening in one wall, the setting sun casting its last glare over the dark, flat country to the west. Narrow windows faced towards the fortress. A stack of crates took up one corner, the captain general’s chair sat in another. Beside it a table was covered with a mess of scattered cards, half-eaten sweetmeats and bottles of varying colour and fullness. “How goes the fight?”

  Friendly sat cross-legged, dice between his knees. “It goes.”

  Monza moved to one of the narrow windows. It was almost night, now, and she could barely see any sign of the assault. Perhaps the odd flicker of movement at the tiny battlements, the odd glint of metal in the light of the bonfires scattered across the rocky slopes. But she could hear it. Vague shouting, faint screaming, clattering metal, floating indistinctly on the breeze.

  Cosca slid into the battered captain general’s chair and rattled the bottles by putting his muddy boots up on the table. “We four, together again! Just like Cardotti’s House of Leisure! Just like Salier’s gallery! Happy times, eh?”

  There was the creaking swoosh of a catapult released and a blazing missile sizzled overhead, shattered against the great foremost tower of the fortress, sending up a gout of flame, shooting out arcs of glittering embers. The dull flare illuminated ladders against the stonework, tiny figures crawling up them, steel glimmering briefly then fading back into the black.

  “You sure this is the best time for jokes?” Monza muttered.

  “Unhappy times are the best for levity. You don’t light candles in the middle of the day, do you?”

  Shivers was frowning up the slope towards Fontezarmo. “You really think you’ve a chance of carrying those walls?”

  “Those? Are you mad? They’re some of the strongest in Styria.”

  “Then why-”

  “Bad form to just sit outside and do nothing. They have ample stocks of food, water, weapons and, worst of all, loyalty. They might last months in there. Months during which Orso’s daughter, the Queen of the Union, might prevail upon her reluctant husband to send aid.” Monza wondered whether the king learning that his wife preferred women would make any difference…

  “How’s watching your men fall off a wall going to help?” asked Shivers.

  Cosca shrugged. “It will wear down the defenders, deny them rest, keep them guessing and distract them from any other efforts we might make.”

  “Lot of corpses for a distraction.”

  “Wouldn’t be much of a distraction without them.”

  “How do you get men to climb the ladders for that?”

  “Sazine’s old method.”

  “Eh?”

  Monza remembered Sazine displaying the money to the new boys, all laid out in sparkling stacks. “If the walls fall, a thousand scales to the first man on the battlements, a hundred each to the next ten who follow him.”

  “Provided they survive to collect the bounty,” Cosca added. “If the task’s impossible, they’ll never collect, and if they do, well, you achieved the impossible for two thousand scales. It ensures a steady flow of willing bodies up the ladders, and has the added benefit of weeding the bravest men out of the company to boot.”

  Shivers looked even more baffled. “Why would you want to do that?”

  “ ‘Bravery is the dead man’s virtue,’ ” Monza muttered. “ ‘The wise commander never trusts it.’ ”

  “Verturio!” Cosca slapped one leg. “I do love an author who can make death funny! Brave men have their uses but they’re damned unpredictable. Worrying to the herd. Dangerous to bystanders.”

  “Not to mention potential rivals for command.”

  “Altogether safest to cream them off,” and Cosca mimed the action with a careless flick of two fingers. “The moderately cowardly make infinitely better soldiers.”

  Shivers shook his head in disgust. “You people got a pretty fucking way of making war.”

  “There is no pretty way of making war, my friend.”

  “You said a distraction,” cut in Monza.

  “I did.”

  “From what?”

  There was a sudden fizzing sound and Monza saw fire out of the corner of her eye. A moment later the heat of it washed across her cheek. She spun, the Calvez already part-drawn. Ishri was draped across the crates behind them, sprawled out lazily as an old cat in the sun, head back, one long, thin, bandaged leg dangling from the edge of the boxes and swinging gently back and forth.

  “Can’t you ever just say hello?” snapped Monza.

  “Where would be the fun in that?”

  “Do you have to answer every question with another?”

  Ishri pressed one hand to her bandaged chest, black eyes opening wide. “Who? Me?” She rolled something between her long finger and thumb, a little black grain, and flicked it with uncanny accuracy into the lamp beside Shivers. It went up with a flash and sizzle, cracking the glass hood and spraying sparks. The Northman stumbled away, cursing, flicking embers off his shoulder.

  “Some of the men have taken to calling it Gurkish sugar.” Cosca smacked his lips. “Sounds sweeter, to my ear, than Gurkish fire.”

  “Two dozen barrels,” murmured Ishri, “courtesy of the Prophet Khalul.”

  Monza frowned. “For a man I’ve never met he likes us a lot.”

  “Better yet…” The dark-skinned woman slithered from the boxes like a snake, waves running through her body from shoulders down to hips as if she had no bones in her, arms trailing after. “He hates your enemies.”

  “No better basis for an alliance than mutual loathing.” Cosca watched her contortions with an expression stuck between distrust and fascination. “It’s a brave new age, my friends. Time was you had to dig for months, hundreds of strides of mine, tons of wood for props, fill it up with straw and oil, set it on fire, run like merry hell, then half the time it wouldn’
t even bring the walls down. This way, all you need do is sink a shaft deep enough, pack the sugar in, strike a spark and-”

  “Boom,” sang Ishri, up on her toes and stretching to her fingertips.

  “Ker-blow,” returned Cosca. “It’s how everyone’s conducting sieges these days, apparently, and who am I to ignore a trend…” He flicked dust from his velvet jacket. “Sesaria’s a genius at mining. He brought down the bell tower at Gancetta, you know. Somewhat before schedule, admittedly, and a few men did get caught in the collapse. Did I ever tell you-”

  “If you bring the wall down?” asked Monza.

  “Well, then our men pour through the breach, overwhelm the stunned defenders and the outer ward will be ours. From the gardens within we’ll have level ground to work with and room to bring our numbers to bear. Carrying the inner wall should be a routine matter of ladders, blood and greed. Then storm the palace and, you know, keep it traditional. I’ll get my plunder and you’ll get-”

  “My revenge.” Monza narrowed her eyes at the jagged outline of the fortress. Orso was in there, somewhere. Only a few hundred strides away. Perhaps it was the night, the fire, the heady mixture of darkness and danger, but some of that old excitement was building in her now. That fierce fury she’d felt when she hobbled from the bone-thief’s crumbling house and into the rain. “How long until the mine’s ready?”

  Friendly looked up from his dice. “Twenty-one days and six hours. At the rate they’re going.”

  “A shame.” Ishri pushed out her bottom lip. “I so love fireworks. But I must go back to the South.”